Claire McCaskill Plays Moderate, But Is Busted in Nutroots Interview

Off of his hunger strike with Cindy Sheehan, Willie Nelson had enough strength to come and pledge support to Claire McCaskill because, as Willie put it from the 97.1 FM Morning Show with Allman & Smash, “We both want our troops out of Iraq, now.”Mamas don’t let your babies grow up to “Cut & Run”.

He also cited what Nelson saw as their common views on the war in Iraq, which Nelson opposes. McCaskill has called for a phased-out redeployment(?) of troops during the next two years to other parts of the Middle East.

Why does no one ever follow up a silly comment like the one above by Claire McCaskill with a question like, “Which Middle East countries, Claire?… Syria? Iran? Turkey?… Would our troops be more welcomed there?… And, why would we would station our troops in another country when we are fighting an insurgency in Iraq?

-Iraq- My opponent is a stay-the-course, a mindless stay-the-course Senator. Back in May, I gave a very lengthy national security speech where I called for the redeployment of troops within a two-year framework. When given the choice, I would have voted for the Levin-Reed amendment, but I do believe we need to set a framework of 24 months, give or take six months, to completely redeploy.

I think what’s happening today right now is affirmation of what happens when you have a foreign policy that’s objectives are more political than anything else. What happens is you have a nation focused on one conflict to the exclusion of the rest of the world. And meanwhile we have destabilization in Afghanistan, you have the issue of nuclear weapons in Iran and North Korea, and now we see some instability in Israel and Lebanon, and the conflict in Israel with Hamas and with Hizbullah that I think really should have Americans on the edge of their seats.

And I fault this administration for having a lone ranger foreign policy, for forgetting about the word “diplomacy” until six years in today. And I think we’ve got to get busy reestablishing ourselves as good neighbors in the world that want to work with our allies to stabilize the entire planet, and not just one conflict that was entered into without careful planning and thought as to we leave that country better than we found it…

-Domestic Spying- I think the recent Supreme Court decision was very interesting, a slap on the wrist to this administration on how they view the Geneva Convention and how we should be conducting ourselves as it relates to people held in Guantanamo. I think the fact that the Republican Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee has publicly indicated displeasure with being kept in the dark… I have said that I believe that the President has operated outside of the law… terrorists are much like criminals… It’s time to respect that constitutional framework.

-On Leaks and the CIA- I think with this presidency and this administration, I think, clearly they leak what they want us to know and what they don’t want us to know they obfuscate and try to actually keep a secret… I think that many Americans did what I think Karl Rove hopes they’d do and kind of forget that they had dramatically failed to get Osama Bin Laden.

-On Rural Campaigning- So we are spending much more time in rural Missouri. We are making much more of an effort to listen to rural Missouri. I’m spending more time on Ag. policy in this campaign than I ever spent on Ag. policy in the governor’s campaign.

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Finally, Claire gives the Nutroots a big sloppy kiss:

Singer: Final question. If there’s one message you’d like to send out to the progressive blogosphere, to the Netroots, what would that be?

McCaskill:I think you’re doing a great thing for our country(?) What I fear more than anything in the United States of America is an electorate that is not passionate. I may not agree with some of the views held by some of those who spend a lot of time on the progressive blogosphere. There may be times we disagree. But I love the passion, I love the commitment, I love the enthusiasm. It is probably what will save us in this country. And so I say type away and keep working at it. You’ll keep us all honest.

Jim Hoft is the founder of The Gateway Pundit, one of the top conservative news outlets in America. Jim was awarded the Reed Irvine Accuracy in Media Award in 2013 and is the proud recipient of the Breitbart Award for Excellence in Online Journalism from the Americans for Prosperity Foundation in May 2016.